Eternity
by Rose G
Summary: Alone, friendless and half a world away from home, there is only one thing left for this former Sun Hill officer eternity.


Eternity  
Rose G

DISCLAIMER: 'The Bill' characters depicted in this story are copyrighted to Thames Television/Pearson Corp. All other characters depicted in this story are copyrighted to the relevant author or creator.

A /N - Repost, from TBFF, of my first ever fanfic.

_The past is done,  
We've been betrayed - it's true  
Someone said the truth will out,  
I believe without a doubt in you.  
You were there for summer dreaming,  
And you gave me what I need,  
So I hope you'll find your freedom  
For eternity  
Robbie Williams, Eternity _

By himself, long greying hair blowing across a once handsome face, a man walked down a derelict road. A shabby dark trench coat reached almost to his knees and his down at heel shoes leaked. Nothing about him showed what he had been. There was no remaining sign of greatness.

Dimly, he saw two laughing men leave the Police station, and walk into a nearby pub. One was tall, muscular, wearing a close fitting T-shirt and jeans, the other short and ginger haired, a strange gleam in his eyes. Or was he seeing ghosts now, his own tormented past?

Those two men had a home to go to, didn't wake everyday lying in a cardboard box in a rain swept street. They didn't stand near hot dog vans for warmth, beg for food, and scavenge in dustbins. He did.

Dimly, he remembered the place that he'd worked at, the only place that he'd ever loved, and where he had been respected. His thin lips, blue with cold, mumbled the start of his old call sign, then became still. A woman walked towards him, and for an instant his rugged face was lit by a warm, cheeky grin. When he chose, he could be a charmer, and this girl reminded him brutally of the girl he'd left behind. Her looks tore at his heart.

'Got any change, missus?'

The glare that he got in response would have shattered glass. He slumped back against the wall, face burning with shame. He'd had enough of surviving here, and it would be so easy for him to just lie down, and allow the cold to eat away at his exhausted body, until death claimed him for its own. Suicide, what he had always thought of as the cowards way out, and now realised that it took more guts than he would ever have.

But, in a way, he had done just that a few months ago when he had got those false papers, and vanished. And that was why he was here now.

That long winter night, which to him felt colder than Sun Hill had ever been, he lay shivering in a shop doorway, choking back tears of weakness and hunger, and thinking of Sun Hill. Was Jack Meadows still prowling around? Was Geoff Daly happy now? The people in the station, and often, those who had been brought into it, had been his friends and colleagues, and he would have given anything to see any of them now.

Especially John Boulton. The most arrogant, mouthy, ill-mannered Northern git he'd ever met. A man he would have trusted with his life. The man whose life he had tried to save, and then destroyed forever. And Maggie, lovely trusting Maggie, whom he had loved more than he'd ever loved anyone, loved as much as John had loved Claire. All the people he had left behind, as he fled to save his own life.

Nightmares, images of John's smashed and broken bloodstained body haunted him that night, making him wake screaming and drenched in cold sweat.

The blonde women, who watched him ceaselessly, smiled at his discomfort. In her opinion, no hell was bad enough for him. She turned to greet her boss, and was surprised by the look of pity that flicked across his handsome face.

Now a wretched shadow of what he had once been, he begged successfully the next day. The money he got would have enabled him to buy a meal, but instead, he walked quickly over to a public phone box, and dialled the phone number, that in days gone by, he had regarded as his home number. On the other side of the world, the phone rang in the CID office, and D.S Debbie McAllister picked it up.

'Is Mickey Webb there?' It seemed natural to ask for the young D.C, who was so similar to himself that he had to be either best friend or mortal enemy.

'He's just pulled into the car park. Wait a minute.' He didn't care for her tone of voice. It reminded him painfully of Claire.

For an all too brief moment, he went back in time as he listened to the dear, familiar sounds of CID. Duncan's unmistakable Scottish brogue, the soft Yorkshire burr of Jack Meadows as he walked through the office, Danny laughing, Trev opening the filing cabinet. And a host of other voices that he didn't know, and no sound of Kerry, Geoff, and Deakin. All of them, John included, belonged to the past, soon to be forgotten by all except those few who had loved them.

He heard the echoing footsteps as Mickey hurtled across the office, and snatched up the phone, gasping for breath. At least one person hadn't changed.

'Hi, Mickey. It's Don.'

'Sarge?' The response was automatic, made from shock.

'I just called to say I'm sorry. Sorry for everything. Sorry for John, and Maggie. I haven't got long. Claire's found me, and I ain't giving her the joy of nicking me. She wrecked John's life, his last days. For all I know, he died thinking about that stuck up cow. I'm so sorry for that, Mickey. I want you to tell them that.'

'Sarge...' Whatever happened, Beech would always be his boss, and Mickey realised now, someone that he would respect and admire.

'I just wanted you to say goodbye to them all for me. Tell them that I'm sorry, and maybe I'll see you lot - and John - one of these days.'

In the tiny phone box, Don Beech lifted the gun, and pressed it hard against his temple. Automatically, he flinched from the touch of the cold steel, but his courage was too great to allow him to stop now. It was the only way to end this nightmare that he had started himself. Suddenly, for maybe the first time in his life, he knew fear, and shifted the gun very slightly.

Claire Stanton screamed.

Don's finger closed very slowly over the trigger.

Miles away, Mickey Webb heard a dull click, a bang and a scream of terror. He yelled 'Don' involuntarily, and Meadows, unaware of the drama being played out on the other side of the world, had to prise the phone out of Mickey's grasp.

For a split second, Claire fought to save the life of the man who had wrecked hers. She forgot every rule he had smashed, the fact that he had killed John, and her hatred of him. He was just another pathetic victim.

Claire's boss came at a run, and summoning the last of his ebbing strength, Don looked up at him. A handsome man, with a tanned face, steely blue eyes, and dressed in a black leather jacket and jeans. A scent of single malt, hard to come by in Australia, hung around him.

Regretfully, Frank Burnside fixed Don with his unique unblinking stare.

'Well, Don, I never thought that it would come to this. I landed up in CIB, and you was the one they told me to investigate first. I told them no, but it came down to investigating you or loosing my job. I didn't want that, and I'm sorry. John was a good cop, you were a better cop, and I wrecked it. I'm sorry, I set you up, but if it had been my choice, I wouldn't have done it.'

Don's wide blue eyes blazed his hatred for Burnside and Claire, but there was something else in them. He had finally been defeated, and he accepted that. Play a game, like he had done, and you had to be prepared to lose. He gasped 'Forgive me.'

Claire answered softly. 'I forgive you, Don'.

And as Don Beech went into his eternity in the Sydney Street, with Claire Stanton and Frank Burnside beside him, the spirit of John Boulton grinned. The two people he had cared for most of all had made their peace with each other.

And it would be good to see Don again. There was a score to settle after all...


End file.
